Just for Jimmy and Darren Burnett...

I'm still recuperating but it's going well thanks for asking, alas I'm not allowed to drive for another three weeks.  Luckily not much has turned up recently close-by, the Little Blue Heron is, by common concensus, looking like it was a juv Little Egret, I'd seen Marsh Sand in Yorkshire before so the Blacktoft bird wasn't creating too many tears, but I may have travelled to see the Semi-P in Cleveland as it's my bogey bird and have twitched this fucking species on a least four million seperate occasions, the latest of which I ended up chinning a Greenshank here.  If you're bothered.  If you're not bothered just don't bother.

So, as usual, I haven't any birding tales to tell you as I can't get anywhere. I sit and gaze longingly at Surfbirds gallery and can only dream of being out at Spurn trying to find the next rarity and stringing a fly-by Atlantic Petrel. Instead I sit queitly and lonely, staving off malnutrition by eating only Pot Noodles and tinned Lidl's own Ravioli dressed in ill-fitting jogging bottoms, surgical stockings and a white T-shirt with Pot Noodle and Ravioli stains down the right hand side.  From my darkened room I can see green trees yet there is no children's laughter anymore as the school at the top of the hill is peaceful, almost desolate as it is the summer holidays. 

It seems trendy again in birdingblogland to chuck a tune in. 
Here we go.

As a lad I listened to an unfathomably diverse list of artists from (honestly) Maiden to Wet Wet Wet, Bad Company to Lou Reed and Metallica to The Stylistics!  What the fuck?  I suppose Maiden were the band of our youth with Jim, Darren Burnett and I seeing the band several times in the late eighties/early nineties.  But from being brilliant they released No Prayer for the Dying and became a bit shit.  Okay, maybe Tailgunner was okay, but what the fuck is Public Enema No 1 all about?  Running silent running deep, we are your final prayer warriors in secret sleep a merchantman's nightmare, sorry I'm not buying this.  As for Mother Russia what kind of epic is that?  Five and a half minutes?  Fuck off.  It shouldn't be even mentioned in the same breath as Mariner or can it lick the boots of something not exactly brilliant like Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, it's all so futile.  Then Metallica (and Diamond Head) started wailing:

My mother was a witch,

She was burned alive,

thankless little bitch

for the tears I cried.

What what what?  What the fuck am I listening to? I'm eighteen, have a unhealthy interest in girls and here I am blasting the above lyric out from a c90 tape on my stereo in my Capri Gear!  What are those girls over there going to think?  If they're not dressed in black with black and crazy purple eye shadow and stinking of petulia oil then they're not exactly going to come over and go for a spin round the block in my imaginary Capri Gear are they?  As for fingering, you've got no chance.

Rightly or wrongly, I split from the heavy scene and found my way into guitar based mainstream bands like Oasis, Ocean Colour Scene and the Stone Roses, not that it was a deliberate switch I suppose. 

I was going to carry on talking about my music background but nobody gives two fucks about it to be honest.  Even I'm bored so I'll stick to talking about Maiden even though I've said all along that I'm not going to talk about Maiden as it would be stepping on a fellow blogger's toes.  Anyway, these are the things that only a true Maiden fan can ever know.  Did you know the following pointless facts?:

Gangland should never have made it to the Beast album, Total Eclipse should've been included instead

Even Maiden founder, leader and bassist Harry admits the above.

West Ham will beat Arsenal 7-3 sometime in the future.

On the album Live After Death the sleeve gives to the lyrics to Revelations as 'a cleaver path for the fools who know' which is during the 'Just a babe in a black abyss' bit which is after the "excellent guitar bit" which made McKinneys Long Tailed Tit drop dead out of the tree.  Fuck AC/DC though, they're shit and sound like Quo.

Adrian sings lead vocal on only one Maiden song called Reach Out.  "It's over your head and you don't seem to undertstand".  To which Bruce seems a bit put out because he absolutely fucking belts out the backing vocals in the chorus as if to say "There, that's fucking singing Adrian, stick to fucking She's a Roller".

The Mekon lives in L.A.

On the live version of Remember Tomorrow which featured as a B-Side to Number of the Beast in 1982, you can just hear Brucey warming up right at the begining, he sings "Unchain Unchain the colours" really fast and low-pitched.  Interesting eh?  You bet your ass it's fucking interesting.

Rod Smallwood had a fiver bet with the organiser at The Marquee when Maiden first played there.  Rod said that Maiden would sell out, the organiser said that an unsigned band who had never played the Marquee before had NO chance of getting anywhere near selling out.  As the last ticket got sold there were still fans outside trying to get in...

Harry's first band was called Gypsy's Kiss which is cockerney facking rhymin slang innit.

Actually, Gypsy's Kiss were due to play the 'Metal Club' on the back cover of Somewhere in Time.

I actually built the Somewhere in Time Eddie during my art A level. I finished the head and torso then had a big fuck off steel frame built for the legs so it would be free standing but I ran out of time and the papier-machee (fuck you spell-check) started stinking in me Dad's garage so he took it to tip.

The frequent time changes in a lot of Maiden's songs are due to a lot of material being recorded during jamming.  The band jam and record the bits they like (that at this point are nothing to do with any song) and introduce them to a song when writing.  i.e. the really slow bit in Mariner could've actually ended up as a slow bit in Powerslave if they'd so wished.  When I found this out, it actually detracted something from the songs for me.  I'd had this preconception that they "wrote a song" and it was all meant to be and it was amazing how they'd written such riffs, lead-breaks and time changes for these songs.  Spoilt it a bit really.

I best leave it there.

Here we go...

Finally a tune...

Here's Depeche Mode!

Only joking.

What song then?  It really depends what mood you're in as the music is really quite diverse.  How about a floor filling crowd pleaser that they play at every gig like Run to the Hills or Beast?  Well, I think ultimately the seasoned Maiden gig-goer is "bored" of these kind of songs, if bored is the right word.  When we used to go we used to hope that these songs be omitted and they play some old school stuff that we'd never heard them play before like Prowler, Rue Morgue or Innocent Exile, y'know stuff like that.  What about stuff like that then?  What about brilliantly written later stuff like Infinite Dreams or 7th Son?  Fuck it, I could go on forever with this debate as to which song to 'play'.  Initially I was gonna give you a Rock Top Five today then in a few weeks a sort of Indie-Madchester stylee Top Five and so on, but it looks like I'm gonna have to, just for you Jimmy and Darren, give you a Maiden Top Five to give a true cross section of The Irons.

Pull up a chair, a bottle of Jack, have a lengthy toot on that bottle of poppers you were saving, put your denim cut-off on with Rainbow and Saxon patches on the back, sit back and and listen to this lot.  Here's a song, dur, called Driftaaaaa...wanna here you singing on this one, eh...

Maiden live at the Marquee in 1980 doing Drifter with Di'anno on vocals.

Must've been Dennis Stratton and Clive Burr in the line up too.

Two days after this gig Toyah headlined The Marquee.

And that's true that.

I think I'd have a go on Toyah.

Yeah, why not.

I bet it looks like last years hanging basket nowadays

I just can't she her keeping it tidy these days.

I bet it looks like Terry Waite's allotment.

Changeover period with Brucey now doing the "older" stuff.  Rue Morgue.

That's all I'm saying.

Apart from: I can't speak French so I couldn't explain and like a fool I started running away!

Revelations from Live after Death from the now infamous

Longbeach Arena in Southern Californiaaaaarrr!

I actually missed a great Maiden fact earlier. 

It was actually ME that shouts "Mother Fuckers" at the end of Revelations. 

And that's true that. 

Well, it might not be but I can tell you something about the "Mother Fuckers" incident though.

The album was recorded on a different night to the video release

yet they BOTH have the "Mother Fuckers" incident on!

One, or both, has been dubbed on!  Believe me, it's true.

This clip is from the video, you can tell it's a different recording to the

album yet it has the Mother Fucker incident at the end! 

Amazing factoids for you all today. 

What's that?  You're not bothered?  Well fucking Jimmy and Darren Burnett are so fuck you.

7th Son live from Maiden England.

Later masterpiece with fucking synthesisers!

A fan once said to Bruce: I want to play Heavy Metol with synthesisorrr!

And Bruce said No, you can't play Heavy Metal with a Synthesiser.

But they did in the end.

Bruce is still having a go here but not long afer this became disinterested and

started covering David Bowie numbers and his Maiden performances

started to suffer so Harry replaced him with Blaze Bayley and

everything after 7th Son is shite and Blaze should've stayed with Wolfsbane. 

And you have the audacity to call US fat bastards?  You fucking wankers!

And to finish in style....

Harold.

It just had to be Harold.

Glory.

..............................